Question: I need a system that integrates with my existing practice management system to optimize patient communications and reduce costs.

Dental Intelligence is an analytics platform that's designed to help dental practices work better. It connects to existing practice software and automates lots of tasks to free up staff time and resources. The platform includes patient communication tools like online scheduling, digital forms, reminders and mass communications, along with analytics to help you spot gaps in your schedule and optimize patient appointments. The company says it's helped improve patient engagement, appointment scheduling and practice productivity in more than 9,000 dental practices.

Another good choice is QliqSOFT, a HIPAA-compliant digital patient engagement and communication system. QliqSOFT offers QliqCHAT for secure messaging, Quincy for workflow automation, patient engagement tools to cut down on phone calls and automate tasks, Care Campaigns for cohort-based outreach and digital forms for electronic data collection. It connects to existing systems, too, with features like image capture, custom forms and bidirectional integration for patient validation, so it's a good choice for automating patient prep, intake and followup.

Klara is another good option, a patient engagement platform that consolidates communication channels and helps providers collaborate. Klara automates outreach with personalized reminders, instructions and followup while maintaining HIPAA compliance. It connects to several EHR systems, including athenahealth, Veradigm and Nextech, and offers a patient portal for encrypted messages. Klara has cut phone calls by hundreds of hours, freeing up time for health care providers and improving patient satisfaction, the company says.